OK. So cigarette advertising has been banned on F1 cars since about 2007/2008.

But one just has to wonder, if history is re-written on something so frivolous as a F1 car – and unannounced, mind you – just what else are the powers, the Leftist powers that be, re-writing history on?

Arguments over the commercial structure and regulations in the sport re-started in the mid-2000s with McLaren and their part owner Mercedes again amongst teams threatening to start a rival series until 2009 when another Concorde Agreement that is effective until the end of 2012 was settled upon.

That Concord agreement breaks in 2013, the same year FIA wants F1 cars to have four cylinder engines. Mclaren ain’t happy. You can bet your bottom dollar Ferrari is pissed. None of the drivers or fans want it.

Yet the FIA has pushed ahead its agenda for its beloved baby formula.

Make sense?

Of course not.

And give us a break. I was too young in 1985 to actually REMEMBER Prost’s car.

Any corrections in comments are most welcome.

UPDATE III

Tim Blair emails:

Easy mistake for young players. Germany was ahead of everyone when it came
to banning cig ads.

Some teams found better ways to get around it than McLaren’s simple
block-out technique. The
Zakspeed team of the mid-80s was sponsored by cigarette maker West, so in
Germany they just
changed the signage to East. Problem solved.

You’ve heard that we’re running out of oil. You’ve heard that natural gas has a finite and ever-shortening supply. The media has been reporting on Peak Oil for decades, and the peak has always been just around the next corner. But what if that weren’t true, and for practical purposes, the US has an unlimited supply of fossil fuel for its energy needs? Would that not undercut the entire notion of an energy crisis, except as self-inflicted?

*Hey, ever since breaking the BER (despite what the Australian reckons), it’s rare this not-so-humble blogger gets a scoop on anything, so I’ll enjoy beating Hot Air to something (first and only time, lol?) for a little while, thank you very much.

Like this:

It’s better to be safe than sorry. We all accept this as a commonsense maxim. But can it also guide public policy? Advocates of the precautionary principle think so, and argue that formalizing a more “precautionary” approach to public health and environmental protection will better safeguard human well-being and the world around us. If only it were that easy.

Simply put, the precautionary principle is not a sound basis for public policy. At the broadest level of generality, the principle is unobjectionable, but it provides no meaningful guidance to pressing policy questions. In a public policy context, “better safe than sorry” is a fairly vacuous instruction. Taken literally, the precautionary principle is either wholly arbitrary or incoherent. In its stronger formulations, the principle actually has the potential to do harm.

Moody’s Investors Service warned Thursday that it may soon downgrade the U.S. credit rating because of mounting concerns that the government will default, adding new urgency to negotiations between President Obama and congressional Republicans over the nation’s debt.

Like this:

Following a meeting of its World Motor Sport Council (WMSC) in the Spanish city of Barcelona on Friday, the FIA has released details of regulation changes which could come into force for the 2013 season. The sport’s governing body, however, also revealed that a vote could be taken to change the timing of their introduction.

Why would Formula One, of all sports, continue to pander to the Green Brigade? Just how many hippies does one see at an F1 event?

Memo to Jean Todt: the aging hippies and their useful idiot acolytes want F1 DEAD, and you’re doing their job for them.

And not only will the engines be smaller and most likely sound horrible compared to what we have now, but the cars will be 20kg heavier. Double Fail.

The only silver lining is that the 2013 date for the new engines (the car I’ll be driving to see the race in 2013* has a bigger engine) could be postponed. One can only hope by “postponed” they mean shoot the bloody engines out into space with Al Gore attached.